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Melut fire, December 2016 Melut

Out · last detection 10 Dec 2016, 11:01 UTC

The fire started on 6 December 2016 in Melut, South Sudan, and satellites saw it burning for 5 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 5,252 hectares from heat detections, spread across a single municipality.

It is the 265th largest in Upper Nile since 2016 (of 284 with a page). Number 229 in South Sudan in 2016, of 244.

Burnt area
5,252ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
5days
6 Dec 2016 – 10 Dec 2016
Municipalities hit
1
counties
Started on
6 Dec
2016
Heat detections
114
in a single hotspot: 157 MW
Danger at start
61
Extreme · FWI index
Energy released
1.6GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

10 Dec 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 6 Dec10 Dec

How it evolved, day by day

678910

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

39°high
43km/h · peak gust
9%lowest humidity

It had gone 39 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. Melut where it started
    5,286 ha reached on 6 Dec
    0.8 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

The weather day by day

ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, the standard reference for past weather, and the Canadian Fire Weather Index (the same system Copernicus uses), computed by WorldFires from that data. Days after the fire run until the first rain.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
6 Dec 39.2 °C 9 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
7 Dec 38.3 °C 14 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 63
8 Dec 38.0 °C 14 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 64
9 Dec 38.0 °C 16 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
10 Dec 37.9 °C 16 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 63
11 Dec after 38.0 °C 17 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
12 Dec after 38.4 °C 18 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
13 Dec after 38.6 °C 18 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
14 Dec after 36.9 °C 16 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 62
15 Dec after 36.4 °C 14 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
16 Dec after 35.6 °C 17 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
17 Dec after 36.1 °C 17 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 60
18 Dec after 37.3 °C 18 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 61
19 Dec after 36.8 °C 20 % 40 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 58
20 Dec after 38.0 °C 17 % 43 km/h 0.0 mm Extreme 59

Before and after, from space

Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.

Before · 29 Nov 2016
After · 17 Dec 2016

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 114Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
⬇ Download CSV Times in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.
Date and timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in South Sudan ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Melut fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 6 December 2016 and 10 December 2016: 5 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 5,252 hectares (52.5 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire only entered Melut (5,286 ha, 0.8 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 39.2 °C, humidity dropped to 9 % and gusts hit 43 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 64, class Extreme.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of South Sudan (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

Where to verify it

A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.

Satellite cross-check

Does something look wrong on this page?

This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.

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Where this data comes from

The perimeter comes from the Copernicus Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS), which rebuilds it from MODIS and VIIRS heat detections and publishes it under CC BY 4.0. It is not measured on imagery as in Europe, so it is an estimate. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Municipal boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Intergovernmental Organisations (CC BY 3.0 IGO)). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ from each country’s official figure.